[GL] I'm Just A Side Character... So Why Is The Heroine Chasing Me?!-Chapter 60: Small repairs

It rained on the fifth day.

Not the gentle kind that misted the gardens and made the plum blossoms glow. The heavy kind. The kind that turned the training grounds into mud and hammered the rooftops so loudly that conversation became impossible unless you were willing to shout.

Lan Yue was crossing the covered walkway near the herb garden when she saw Zhao Lingxi standing at the edge of the pathway, stopped dead, staring at the curtain of rain between her and the dormitory building thirty feet away.

She had no umbrella. 𝒇𝒓𝙚𝒆𝔀𝓮𝓫𝒏𝓸𝙫𝓮𝓵.𝓬𝙤𝙢

It was such a small, ordinary problem that it caught Lan Yue off guard. Zhao Lingxi, who could shatter ice formations with a flick of her wrist, who had survived ten years of exile, who carried herself with the composure of a woman twice her age, was standing at the edge of a covered walkway looking at rain like it had personally offended her.

Lan Yue had an umbrella. She had taken it from the supply rack near the dining hall because Bethany’s survival instincts included always being prepared for weather changes, even in a world where people could fly on swords.

She should keep walking. Zhao Lingxi did not want her help. Zhao Lingxi did not want her presence. Zhao Lingxi had spent the last five days treating her like a piece of scenery that had been rearranged to a less noticeable corner of the room.

Lan Yue walked over and held the umbrella out.

She did not say anything. No apology. No explanation. No nervous chatter. She just extended her arm and offered the umbrella the way you offer something to someone who needs it, without conditions.

Zhao Lingxi looked at the umbrella. Then at Lan Yue. Her expression was unreadable. That perfect, polished blankness she had been wearing like armor for days.

"You will get wet," she said.

"I know."

"That is foolish."

"I know that too."

A beat of silence filled only by the hammering rain.

Zhao Lingxi took the umbrella. Their fingers did not touch. Lan Yue had been careful about that. She pulled her hand back, nodded once, and turned to walk away.

"Lan Yue."

She stopped. She did not turn around. She was afraid that if she turned around and saw that blank expression again, the small, fragile thing she had just managed to do would collapse.

"Thank you," Zhao Lingxi said.

Two words. Quiet. Simple. But delivered without the mechanical politeness of the past five days. Delivered the way a person thanks someone when they mean it and are slightly annoyed that they mean it.

Lan Yue walked into the rain and got thoroughly soaked in twelve seconds. She did not mind at all.

That evening, Tang Xiaoli found a dry set of robes folded neatly outside Lan Yue’s door. No note. No name. Just clean, warm fabric in exactly Lan Yue’s size, placed precisely where she would find them.

Tang Xiaoli raised an eyebrow. "Those are from the senior disciples’ reserve. Only someone with direct access to the quartermaster could requisition that quality."

Lan Yue held the robes against her chest and said nothing. The red thread on her wrist, dark for five days, flickered once. Barely visible. Like a candle flame trying to catch in wind.

On the sixth morning, two days before the match, Lan Yue was eating breakfast in the dining hall when Zhao Lingxi sat down across from her.

Not near her. Not at the same table by coincidence. Across from her. Deliberately. With a tray of congee and pickled vegetables, placed on the table with the precise, controlled movements of someone who had thought about this decision for longer than they would ever admit.

Lan Yue froze with her chopsticks halfway to her mouth.

Zhao Lingxi ate. She did not speak. She did not look up. She consumed her breakfast with the same methodical focus she gave to everything, each bite measured, each movement economical. To anyone watching, it would look like two people who happened to sit at the same table.

But Lan Yue knew better. Every other table in the hall was available. Three of them were closer to the door. Two were closer to the tea station. Zhao Lingxi had walked past all of them and sat here.

Lan Yue put the chopsticks down. Her appetite had vanished, replaced by something that felt like swallowing sunlight. She stared at her congee and tried to keep her face neutral, which was impossible because her face had apparently decided to attempt six expressions simultaneously.

They ate in silence for ten minutes.

When Zhao Lingxi finished, she stood, collected her tray, and paused. Not long. Half a second. Just enough for her gaze to move across the table and settle on Lan Yue’s face for the first time in nearly a week.

She did not smile. She did not soften. But the blankness was gone. In its place was something guarded and cautious, like a hand extended halfway and held there, waiting to see if it would be slapped away.

Then she left.

Lan Yue sat at the table for another five minutes, not eating, not moving, her heart doing something ridiculous and undignified in her chest that she absolutely refused to examine.

That afternoon, the rain stopped. Lan Yue was reviewing her notes on Qin Wen’s delivery schedule when Mo Tian appeared at her door, carrying a pot of tea and wearing an expression of theatrical solemnity.

"I come bearing intelligence," he announced.

"You come bearing tea."

"Tea is intelligence. The quality of a man’s tea reveals the quality of his mind." He sat down without being invited and poured two cups. "Zhao Lingxi asked about you today."

Lan Yue’s hand jerked. Tea sloshed over the rim of her cup. "What?"

"She came to me after the morning training session. She asked, and I quote, whether you had been sleeping properly. She said you looked tired at breakfast."

"She barely looked at me at breakfast."

"And yet she catalogued the circles under your eyes, the fact that you only ate half your congee, and that your hands were stained with ink, which she correctly deduced meant you had been writing late into the night." Mo Tian sipped his tea. "For someone who is not looking at you, she is remarkably observant about the details of your face."

Lan Yue pressed her ink stained fingers against the table. "What did you tell her?"

"I told her you were working on something important and that you were far too stubborn to take care of yourself while doing it." He paused. "She said, ’She has always been like that.’ And then she left."

She has always been like that. Present tense wrapped around a past tense observation. Not "she was like that." Not "she used to be." Always.

The word sat in Lan Yue’s chest and glowed.

"She is thawing," Mo Tian said. "Slowly. Like a glacier deciding whether to become a river. Do not rush her."

"I am not rushing anything."

"You are vibrating."

"I am not vibrating."

"Your knee has been bouncing since I said her name."

Lan Yue flattened both hands on her knees. Mo Tian smiled into his teacup.

That night, Lan Yue was leaving the library when she nearly walked into Zhao Lingxi coming around a corner. They both stopped. Close. Close enough that Lan Yue could smell the faint scent of cold plum blossoms that always clung to Zhao Lingxi’s hair.

The corridor was empty. The lanterns cast warm pools of light on the wooden floor. Somewhere outside, crickets sang in the wet grass.

"You are still awake," Zhao Lingxi said. Not an accusation. An observation. Possibly a concern disguised as an observation.

"Research," Lan Yue said. "For the... I am looking into something. For the tournament."

Zhao Lingxi studied her. The guarded expression from breakfast was still there, but thinner now. More translucent. Like ice that had been slowly melting from underneath.

"You should sleep," Zhao Lingxi said.

"You should also sleep."

"I asked first."

The corner of Lan Yue’s mouth twitched. It was involuntary. A reflex from weeks of banter that her body remembered even when her brain was screaming at her to be careful.

Zhao Lingxi saw it. Something shifted in her eyes. Not warmth exactly. The memory of warmth. The shadow of what warmth used to look like when it lived there freely.

"Goodnight, Lan Yue," she said. Soft. Careful. Like placing a cracked bowl back on a shelf.

"Goodnight, Lingxi."

Zhao Lingxi walked past her. Their shoulders did not touch. But the distance was smaller than before. An inch closer than politeness required. Maybe two.

Lan Yue stood in the corridor and pressed her hand over her wrist. The red thread was warm. Faintly. Tentatively. Like a small animal emerging from hiding, testing whether the world outside was safe yet.

She closed her eyes and let herself feel it.

Not fixed. Not forgiven. But no longer nothing. Something small and fragile had been set down between them, placed with the care of someone who knew exactly how easily it could break.

It was enough. For now, it was enough.